Facebook users in Asia are deserting the social network

FACEBOOK was the only major social network to experience a drop in active usage in 2014, falling by nine per cent compared to the previous year.

However, it is still by far the most popular social network outside of China, according to researchers from Global Web Index, with 81 per cent of internet users claiming to be members of the site.

Facebook's decline, measured in the rate of people actively using the site per month over the year, was most marked in Asia, with native sites like WeChat and Qzone dominating.

Pinterest and Tumblr experienced huge growth in 2014, with a surge of 97 per cent and 95 per cent respectively, while usage at Instagram and LinkedIn went up by 47 per cent and 38 per cent respectively.

Snapchat was the fastest growing app in 2014 with a 57 per cent increase on 2013 figures.

YouTube was visited by 82 per cent of internet users between the ages of 16 and 64, which puts it ahead of Facebook, which was 'only' visited by 73 per cent of active users.